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Catch this buzz via Zoom

Bee Haven offers free classes online in November; sign up now

Sacramento Digs Gardening
BY Debbie Arrington PUBLISHED OCT 13, 2020

Bees flock to a pollen party on this Lemon Queen sunflower. (Can you spot all nine bees?) Learn how to help bees in your garden through Zoom classes offered by the Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven. (Photos: Kathy Morrison)

Bees need flowers – and friends. Learn how you can help bees in your garden with a series of fun and informative online classes devoted to these important pollinators.

Due to the pandemic, the Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven at UC Davis will host its fall classes via Zoom. Offered free to the public, each class will include a 20-minute presentation followed by questions and answers, according to Christine Casey, who oversees the Bee Haven. The classes will be presented at 6 p.m. on the first three Mondays of November. Sign up in advance to make sure you have a spot.

Here are Casey’s course descriptions:

Creating a Bee Garden (6 p.m. Nov. 2)

We’ll cover the basics of building a garden that has the components needed to provide good habitat for bees and other pollinators. Bees need more than flowers, and not all flowers meet bees’ needs equally. If you’re interested in starting or expanding your bee garden, join us to learn more.

Bees love zinnias, but they need more than flowers to flourish.

Common Bees in Gardens (6 p.m. Nov. 9)

Those big black “bumble bees” you see so often? They’re not bumble bees at all! Learn how to identify common bees in California gardens and how to distinguish bees from other insects.

Bees in the Home Food Garden (6 p.m. Nov. 16)

Good yield from your home food garden starts with successful pollination. Learn about the common bees that pollinate food crops and how you can support them in your garden.

Registration links for each session: http://beegarden.ucdavis.edu

Meanwhile, check out the Bee Haven for yourself. The Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven is open during the pandemic, Casey said.

Visitors are welcome to see the bees at work in the half-acre garden, devoted to bee pollinator conservation and education. It’s located at 1 Bee Biology Road on the UC Davis campus.

Admission and parking are free. The Bee Haven is open daily from dawn to dusk with a later opening time on Tuesdays (10 a.m.) and Wednesdays (11 a.m.) to accommodate social distancing during garden maintenance.

For directions and more: http://beegarden.ucdavis.edu .

- Debbie Arrington

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Sacramento pollinator habitat classes online classes UC Davis gardening vegetables bees COVID-19 pollinators Honey Bee Haven flowers

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Garden Checklist for week of Nov. 3

November still offers good weather for fall planting:

* If you haven't already, it's time to clean up the remains of summer. Pull faded annuals and vegetables. Prune dead or broken branches from trees.

* Now is the best time to plant most trees and shrubs. This gives them plenty of time for root development before spring growth. They also benefit from fall and winter rains.

* Set out cool-weather annuals such as pansies and snapdragons.

* Lettuce, cabbage and broccoli also can be planted now.

* Plant garlic and onions.

* Keep planting bulbs to spread out your spring bloom. Some possible suggestions: daffodils, crocuses, hyacinths, tulips, anemones and scillas.

* This is also a good time to seed wildflowers and plant such spring bloomers as sweet pea, sweet alyssum and bachelor buttons.

* Rake and compost leaves, but dispose of any diseased plant material. For example, if peach and nectarine trees showed signs of leaf curl this year, clean up under trees and dispose of those leaves instead of composting.

* Save dry stalks and seedpods from poppies and coneflowers for fall bouquets and holiday decorating.

* For holiday blooms indoors, plant paperwhite narcissus bulbs now. Fill a shallow bowl or dish with 2 inches of rocks or pebbles. Place bulbs in the dish with the root end nestled in the rocks. Add water until it just touches the bottom of the bulbs. Place the dish in a sunny window. Add water as needed.

* Give your azaleas, gardenias and camellias a boost with chelated iron.

* For larger blooms, pinch off some camellia buds.

* Prune non-flowering trees and shrubs while dormant.

* To help prevent leaf curl, apply a copper fungicide spray to peach and nectarine trees after they lose their leaves this month. Leaf curl, which shows up in the spring, is caused by a fungus that winters as spores on the limbs and around the tree in fallen leaves. Sprays are most effective now.

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